Yesterday I was depressed about the election. Today I'm fighting back. The 2012 election cycle begins today and there are concrete things we can do each and every day to promote our agenda between now and then. As candidate Obama said, "we are the people we've been waiting for" and we need to get busy.
First, we need to make sure that the recently passed financial reform legislation remains as strong as possible. The Volcker Rule of the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act prohibits the kind of risky investment of capital that led to the recent financial crisis. The financial market is trying to weaken how the Rule is applied. Please click on the link below, search for the Volcker Rule, and add a public comment encouraging regulators to apply the Volcker Rule as strictly and as broadly as possible to protect the American taxpayer from Wall Street risk-taking. Today is the last day for public comments, so make your voice heard now.
Public Comments Page
Next... John Boehner and Mitch McConnell have already set their sights on using the repeal of health care reform to defeat President Obama in 2012. The only way to change public opinion about health care reform is to educate the public about what's in it. We must increase awareness of all the good things that are in the legislation, such as:
*the elimination of the donut hole in Medicare D prescription drug coverage
*elimination of pre-existing exlusions and coverage limits
*insurance exchanges and subsidies designed to make insurance more affordable
*high risk insurance pool for those currently being denied coverage
*increased accountability from the insurance industry
*the option of allowing children to stay on their parents' plan until age 26
*increased funding for preventive care, community health centers, and primary care
We need to start writing letters to the editor of our local papers asking why Republicans want to take these benefits away from those struggling to find insurance and pay for health insurance. For those who don't feel they know enough about health care reform to write a letter, the Kaiser Family Foundation website is an excellent resource.
Finally, we need to spread the word about the positive impact the stimulus has had and the economic growth our nation has experienced over the past year. Again write letters to the editor, post on social network sites, attend public forums and speak out. We have to spread the spread the word at a local level if we hope to combat the talking heads on Fox News